Fight the Empire

We live in an empire that began 500 years ago with the European conquest of the Americas. This program looks at how the empire permeates our lives.

What are we doing in the world? What are we doing to the world?

George Kennan was an influential US diplomat during the Cold War years. It was he who devised the containment strategy against the Soviet Union (as opposed to a more aggressive rollback policy). In February 1948 Kennan presented a document to President Truman, Presidential Policy Statement #23, which includes the following:

"The US has 50 percent of the world's wealth, but only 6.3 percent of its population. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which permits us to maintain this position of disparity...To do so we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and day-dreaming, and our attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives.

"We should cease to talk about vague and unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are hampered by idealistic slogans the better."

Some have claimed that Kennan was speaking as a foreign policy "realist," and arguing against an ideological anti-Communist crusade. That may be so, but his words are clear, as Noam Chomsky has pointed out. The US intends to keep for itself an unfair share of the world's resources. The main difference between the realists and the ideologues is one of tactics in pursuing this ignoble goal.

Host Per Fagereng speaks with Gareth Porter is an investigative historian and journalist specializing in U.S. national security policy about Iran. Porter is the author of the recent article, "Clinton Revives Dubious Charge of "Covert" Iranian Nuclear Site.

Tom Engelhardt on "An All-American Nightmare: This Is What Defeat Looks Like"

Host Per Fagereng speaks with Tom Engelhardt, publisher of TomDispatch and the author of "The United States of Fear." They'll talk about his recent article "An All-American Nightmare: This Is What Defeat Looks Like," which is about the end of the Neo-Cons' imperial dreams.

Ray McGovern talks about Iran, an IAEA report on nuclear verification, and Israel

Host Per Fagereng speaks with Ray McGovern, who was a U.S. army officer and CIA analyst for 30 years, about Iran, an IAEA report on nuclear verification in Iran circulated last week, and Israel. McGovern recently said, "What's really new, if anything, in the IAEA report? And why are some U.S. officials, belatedly, playing it down after a lot of pre-release ballyhoo? Does this reflect a nervous attempt to rein in the 'crazies' in Tel Aviv and their neocon friends in Washington? If so, is it likely to have that effect?

There have been a string of attacks on Western forces in Afghanistan this week, killing over 20 troops.
On Tuesday the trial of the Hancock Drone Resisters began. The Resisters are 38 people from throughout Central New York and beyond who converged on Syracuse, New York on April 22, 2011 to protest the piloting of hunter-killer Reaper drones at Hancock Air National Guard Base. They participated in a die-in at the main entrance, symbolizing the indiscriminate killing of civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan by drones.

his new book "The End of Growth: Adapting to Our New Economic Reality."

Host Per Fagereng speaks with author, educator and speaker Richard Heinberg about his new book "The End of Growth: Adapting to Our New Economic Reality."

Richard Heinberg’s latest book goes to the heart of the ongoing financial crisis, explaining how and why it occurred, and what we must do to avert the worst potential outcomes. Written in an engaging, highly readable style, it shows why growth is being blocked by three factors: resource depletion, environmental impacts, and crushing levels of debt.

Interview with financial reporter Michael Hudson about corruption in banking and mortgage industry

Host Per Fagereng interviews Michael Hudson, Staff Writer at iWatch News about the legacy of corruption that still plagues Bank of America and a pattern of fraud at Countrywide Financial Corp., once the nation’s largest mortgage lender.

Host Per Fagereng speaks with Bruce Gagnon, Coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space. He was a co-founder of the Global Network when it was created in 1992.

Between 1983–1998 Bruce was the State Coordinator of the Florida Coalition for Peace & Justice and has worked on space issues for 29 years. In 1987 he organized the largest peace protest in Florida history when over 5,000 people marched on Cape Canaveral in opposition to the first flight test of the Trident II nuclear missile. He was the organizer of the Cancel Cassini Campaign (launched 72 pounds of plutonium into space in 1997).

In 2003 Bruce co-produced a popular documentary video entitled Arsenal of Hypocrisy that spelled out U.S. plans for space domination. Another of his videos, shot in 2009, was entitled Review of Obama's Foreign Policy.

He is also host of a public access TV show called This Issue that currently runs in 13 Maine communities.

Bruce will be speaking in Portland this week on current U.S. space technology strategy, military expansion in the Asia-Pacific region, the effects of our war economy on climate change and ending the corporate domination of congress

April 20, 6:30 p.m.
First Unitarian Church, Fuller Hall

Entrance on SW 12th Avenue, between Salmon and Main
Donations $5-$20 invited

Host Per Fagereng speaks with journalist Ahmed Rashid about the relationship between Islamabad and Kabul and U.S.-Pakistani relations.

Ahmed Rashid is a Pakistani journalist based in Lahore, is a regular contributor to the Financial Times and The Washington Post, and has written for the New York Review of Books, BBC Online, and The Nation as well as various academic and foreign affairs journals. His most recent book is Pakistan on the Brink: The Future of America, Pakistan, and Afghanistan.

When Gilad Atzmon first heard the music of Charlie Parker his life changed. The philosophy behind Bird's musical freedom seemed increasingly at odds with Gilad's life in Israel. He now lives in London, plays jazz and is the author of The Wandering Who: A Study of Jewish Identity Politics?

Host Per Fagereng speaks with Gareth Porter is an investigative historian and journalist specializing in U.S. national security policy about Iran. Porter is the author of the recent article, "Clinton Revives Dubious Charge of "Covert" Iranian Nuclear Site.

Host Per Fagereng speaks with Tom Engelhardt, publisher of TomDispatch and the author of "The United States of Fear." They'll talk about his recent article "An All-American Nightmare: This Is What Defeat Looks Like," which is about the end of the Neo-Cons' imperial dreams.

Host Per Fagereng speaks with Ray McGovern, who was a U.S. army officer and CIA analyst for 30 years, about Iran, an IAEA report on nuclear verification in Iran circulated last week, and Israel. McGovern recently said, "What's really new, if anything, in the IAEA report? And why are some U.S. officials, belatedly, playing it down after a lot of pre-release ballyhoo? Does this reflect a nervous attempt to rein in the 'crazies' in Tel Aviv and their neocon friends in Washington? If so, is it likely to have that effect? Plus news and a report from the Occupy movement as it happens.